


I Might Need You To Hold Me Tonight

by BadHidingSpot



Series: Bradburry 2016 [8]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Library, M/M, Moby Dick - Freeform, Reading, The 100 - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-02
Updated: 2016-03-02
Packaged: 2018-05-24 09:49:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6149656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadHidingSpot/pseuds/BadHidingSpot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles will do anything he can to get a copy of Moby Dick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Might Need You To Hold Me Tonight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [steamcurious](https://archiveofourown.org/users/steamcurious/gifts).



Hold

“Library card, please?” The girl behind the circulation desk asked holding her hand out expectantly. Stiles, being a frequent user of the facilities just rattled his barcode number off to her. The girl looked annoyed but said nothing and only typed the number into the system. “And what can I do for you?”

Stiles cocked a questioning eyebrow at her. “I have a book on hold,” he answered.

“No you don’t,” She replied simply.

“What? No I should. Look at your screen.” Stiles attempted to turn the monitor towards himself and the girl gasped and tried to stop him. He soon saw why as one of the sensitive wires on the monitor came loose and the screen went black. She glowered at him and he tried to look apologetic. “Sorry. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” she huffed as she plugged the monitor back in, “it happens a lot.”

“I’m just sure that I have a book back there.”

“Did you receive a notice via e-mail or in the mail?”

“No, but I put it on hold over a month ago.”

“Well it’s not in yet,” she was trying very hard to be polite but Stiles was clearly telling her something she’d had to sit through several times a day. “When it comes in you will be notified.”

“Listen,” Stiles peered at the girl’s name tag, “Clarke. I really need that book. Don’t you have another copy?”

“Listen, Stiles,” Clarke glanced at the screen now glowing blue with new life to find his name, “but if there were a copy in the library it would have been brought up and put on the hold shelf for you. Then the computer would have sent you a notification. Then i would have given it to you as that is my job and how a library hold system works.”

“Right, I know how it works,” Stiles said pouting, “but see I really want this book and it’s been over a month. I know that the check out length is only twenty-one days.” Stiles spoke from experience of many notices of late fees and overdue items.

“That’s true,” Clarke agreed, her voice taking on a bit of sympathy, “but I’m afraid the book is still checked out and overdue.”

“Well who has it?”

She raised her eyebrows. “I can’t give you that information.”

“Oh come on, what am I going to do with it?”

“Track them down and steal the book?”

“Okay yeah I was,” Stiles huffed, “but come on! I’d be doing you guys a favor.”

“Mr. Stiles there is a line forming behind you,” Clarke sighed, “and your book is not in. However, I know for a fact that Moby Dick is public domain. I can give you a list of websites-”

“I need the physical book,” Stiles whined, “this copy has great endnotes in it.”

“I’m sorry if you’re paper is due or something-”

“I don’t have a paper due.” Stiles cocked his head at her in confusion before realizing that she had thought him a little cooler than he was. Of course most students would be desperate to get a copy, and not just getting it to enjoy good old fashioned Melville. Stiles blushed and quieted himself. “I’ll just let you get back to work I guess.”

“Thank you,” She said as Stiles sulked away. He thrust his hands in his pockets his shoulders slinking into the slump of the defeated as he mosied over to the Classics section to see if maybe, just maybe, the system was wrong and the book was sitting on the shelf where it should. That dark little corner of the college library was scarcely populated unless by freshmen making out between classes. Sometimes Stiles brought a spray bottle with him to use on would-be smoochers and hissed at them like bad cats. He had been asked to please stop doing that and just tell the staff. He was happy to find that today there was no one locking lips in literature and he could peruse the shelves uninterrupted. He had his eyes on the top shelf and was moving around, trying to get a good look at a book that just might be Moby Dick when he tripped. He didn’t just lose his footing in a way where he could catch his balance. No, Stiles trampled over an obstacle and went flying to the ground in said obstacle’s lap. The obstacle glared at him.

“Sorry,” Stiles said rubbing a bruising elbow. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.”

“Well start. You interrupted my reading,” the young man growled. He was older than Stiles, must have been a senior or a graduate student, and had the glower of a wild animal. Or a domesticated yet grumpy cat. His eyebrows were dark and strong, his stubble a force to be reckoned with, and a body that looked like a foster home for muscles. Stiles wondered how this man could be here when he clearly spent all of his time at the gym.

“I’m Stiles,” Stiles said forgetting that he’d disturbed this man and was still in his lap.

“Okay,” he said simply. Stiles cleared his throat and came out of the lap that clearly did not want him there.

“Well, sorry again,” he apologized but the man went right back to reading. Stiles stepped away to find a stool to climb on so he could have a better look at the top shelf but after half an hour of looking all of them were either in use or broken. He was sad to see that the reader was still there when Stiles came back but since he was absorbed so wholly in his reading Stiles figured he didn't’ even notice him returning.

Stiles stood up on his tippy toes and with the new advantage just knew that the book he was seeing must be Moby Dick. The fiend who was holding it ransom past its due date must have been so ashamed of himself (or herself) that they snuck it back onto the shelf without having it checked in. Stiles shook his head clicking his tongue in disappointment. “The youths these days,” he said, much louder than he meant to, and was met with a harsh “shush!” from the reading stranger. Stiles winced and held up his hand mouthing “sorry”. The reader turned back to his book.

Stiles could see the dark blue and worn cover of Moby Dick teasing him from the high shelf. Maybe he could get it if he jumped? He tried a little hop that yielded no success other than his fingertips brushing the spine. He growled as quietly as he could not wanting to be reprimanded again. There was only one thing left to do and all of Stiles’ personal history of his clumsiness, his lack of grace, and his general bad luck did not warn him off of the idea. He was already climbing up the shelf one hand taking firm hold by Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and the other on the shelf where Moby Dick laid. He pulled his body up, his hand reaching for it and grasping it, and then his other hand slipping being too sweaty to hold firmly. Stiles tried to grab and get his footing back but the books, for the first time in his life, betrayed him and could not keep him firmly planted to the shelf. He fell backwards and his life, consisting mostly of arguments he wrote online about the differences between A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones the TV show, flashed through his eyes. He expected to hit his head, maybe crack his spine, or break his leg, and most definitely be banned from the library which might have been the worst thing of all. Instead, he landed in soft, strong arms. He opened his eyes to see the gaze of the grumpy stranger staring down at him with something like concerned annoyance.  _ Did I fall on him again?  _ Stiles wondered, but looking around he saw that the stranger had acutally caught him and kept him from falling.

“Are you okay?” He asked.

“I think so. Yeah,” Stiles answered. The man smiled, a brilliant and incandescent thing, and set Stiles down gently on his feet.

“You make a lot of noise.”

“Sorry. I was trying to get this book,” Stiles held up his reward a little proud that he had it in hand after all this time and trouble.

“War and Peace?”

“What? No,” Stiles looked at the book and saw that he was, in fact, holding the Russian masterpiece instead of the greatest book ever written on whales and whaling. “Ah fuck!” He cursed. “What is Tolstoy even doing up there with Melville?” This small fact outraged Stiles even more than the idea of  _ still _ not having Moby Dick.

“It must be mis-shelved.” The stranger said taking it for him. “We’ll take it to the front. They’ll put it in it’s right place.” He set it down near his little reading nest and began to pick up a few other books that were on the ground. Stiles began to help after he realized that they were only on the floor because he’d tried to scale the shelves and they had dropped with him. It didn’t take too long between the two of them. “I’m Derek,” the stranger offered and Stiles beamed at him.

“Nice to meet you. Thanks for the-er-catching.”

“Sure thing,” Derek said a little amused smirk playing on his face.

“No I mean it. It must have been something if you stopped reading,” Stiles paused to pick the book up and read its title only to gasp. “Moby Dick?”

“Yeah. It’s one of my favorites-”

“You’re the culprit!” Stiles hissed pointing an accusing finger at Derek and clasping the book to his chest like a mother protecting a small child from a mountain lion. “You thief!”

“What?” Derek’s frown was back and he snatched the book a little too easily from Stiles. “What are you talking about? This is my book.”

“You expect me to believe that your copy of Moby Dick just so happens to be the exact copy this library carries?”

Derek held the book up in front of Stiles’ face. “No barcode,” he turned it over, “and no spine label.”

“Oh,” Stiles blushed and cleared his throat, “sorry. I’ve been waiting a while for it. Some ass hole hasn’t turned it in yet.”

Derek grimaced as if the thought of this kind of person turned his stomach like nothing else in the world. “I’m sorry. I hate that.”

“Yeah, well, it’s not like I need it I guess,” Stiles huffed and shuffled his feet on the ground. “I just really wanted to analyze it better this time.”

“You want to borrow mine?” Derek offered pushing the book into Stiles’ hands.

“What? Are you serious?”

“Sure. It’s a great book. It’s my favorite book, actually.”

Stiles broke into a grin. “Moby Dick is your favorite book?”

“Of course. Why shouldn’t it be?”

“No reason,” Stiles said eagerly, “it’s just that most people haven’t even read it.”

“I’ve read it six times.”

“Six times?!” Stiles gasped so deeply that he choked a little on his own spit and a small coughing fit ensued. When he recovered, Derek was taking the book back. “Hey!” Stiles said indignantly.

Derek took a pen out, ignoring Stiles protestations, and began to write on the inside cover. He finished and handed it back. “My number is in there now. So you can return it.”

“Oh,” Stiles said surprised taking the book back and opening it, “thank you. Are you sure? It’s really okay. I know this copy is expensive.”

“Well I saved your life,” Derek said bluntly, “I’d hope you wouldn’t steal from me after.” Derek picked up his messenger bag and swung it over his shoulder. “I have to go. Enjoy the book. It’s better the second time.”

He was already almost out of sight behind the shelves when Stiles snapped out of his slack jawed gaze. Stiles shouted “thank you” after him and was met with a few glares from students trying to study nearby. Stiles immediately took out his phone and text the number written inside the book.

_ Call me Stiles. _

He heard back instantly.  _ Please don’t walk into traffic. _ Stiles laughed.


End file.
